Inspiration For Being A Therapist

I grew up in the United Kingdom. Although I was born in Swansea, South Wales, my family moved into England when I was still of elementary school age. One of my most vivid school memories was of a particularly loved teacher at Elmbridge Road Junior School in Elmbridge, Gloucester, UK. Mr. Rapson was my home room teacher when I was 10 or 11 years old. He was a very short, rotund gentleman with a short-back-and-sides hairdo, extremely baggy brown pinstripe suits, and a habit of twitching and blinking. In retrospect, I think he had Tourettes Syndrome, but back then it was just intriguing to watch him twitch and blink his way through our classes. English, and in particular story writing, was my favorite lesson time. Back then, we used ink pens that you had to continually dip into ink pots which teetered precariously in their roughly carved out holes in the rickety, creaky, wooden school desks - pens that left you with ink stained fingers and spots of Indigo Blue on your school uniform.

On one particular occasion, I had lovingly written, in ink and “joined up” writing, a vivid story, complete with my usual huge cast of characters, all busy relating, chatting and talking to and about themselves. Mr. Rapson bent over my desk and said to me, “All they do is sit and talk to each other, dear girl. Can’t you make them do something more interesting?” Shocked, I sat and pondered his question seriously. What, I thought, could be more exciting than sitting and listening to other people’s stories?

When my paternal grandparents died my father inherited all their books, which came housed in a huge, mahogany bookcase, with sliding glass doors. I believe it was my grandfather, Stanley, who was the avid reader and one of the book collections he had assembled over the years was a complete set of detective fiction by Erle Stanley Gardner, creator of the Perry Mason stories. I must have been about 9 or 10 years old when I picked up the first one and I was hooked. I slowly read my way through the entire collection, falling in love with the characters, fascinated by the complexity of the plots, and the development of the relationships between people. What 10 year old would not have been fascinated by books with titles like, “The Case of the Vagabond Virgin,” “The Case of the Cautious Coquette” and other fascinating and attention-getting headings? Thus began my love-affair with Mystery/Detective fiction. As I grew up, I moved onto Agatha Christie and Arthur Conan Doyle and later I read my way through the mysteries of Patricia Cornwall, Sue Grafton, John Grisham, The Kellermans, P.D.James, Martha Grimes, etc.

Can you see where this is going?

Being a therapist is a great deal like being a detective. Day after day, people come in and sit on the bright red psychotherapy couch in my office. Their job is to tell me stories about their lives and my job is to listen carefully. I hear about their parents, their siblings, their lost loves, their current loves, their fears and confusions. I hear about times in their lives when they have triumphed. I hear about times when they feel disappointed in themselves and feel that they have sadly failed. I hear about places where they feel strong and confident and places where they feel vulnerable and scared. They come in individually, looking for a place to make sense of the pieces they present to me over the weeks and months. They come in with partners, with friends and family members, each person with their unique spin on the same situation, with their own narrative to explain how their lives intersect. My job is to listen respectfully, and be able to pull all the seemingly disparate pieces together. (I have to confess that in this endeavor, I find it much more useful to think of myself as “channeling” Erle Stanley Gardner than Winnicott or Minuchin!)

So, if you’re good at Math in school, you’re told that you would make a great mathematician. If you’re a great athlete, you may be encouraged to think of yourself as an Olympic hopeful. But hardly anbody has words of encouragement or direction for small children who are just plain entranced by what human beings feel, experience, want and need to talk about.

So, yes, I was influenced to become a psychotherapist not just by my own crazy, wacky, dysfunctional family, but also by Mr. Rapson, Erle Stanley Gardner and the legions of mystery writers who came after him. (And there are those who say I look more like Miss Marples as each day passes!)